When I first saw a route overlay for the Prism in AAJ 2011, I wondered: Why had the obvious wide cracks snaking up the middle of the wall been ignored?

As I dug out bushes and pounds of dirt from the beginning of a giant crack, I realized the other guys knew better. After the digging was done, however, the route unfolded like a dream. My partner, Luke Stefurak, and I climbed a full rope length of featured offwidth climbing, protected by small to medium cams. The following pitches included awesome face climbing on stellar rock. The only crux was feeding slack quickly enough to the excited leader, as we raced against the possibility of rain. The face climbing was moderately run-out but very featured. An occasional crack or flake kept things reasonably safe.

We kept to a direct line, mostly up the middle, and after approximately 1,200’ of climbing, reached the upper apex of the wall. Several hundred feet of simul-climbing up the ridge took us to the summit proper, where we recovered a Nalgene with a register. Our route was the fifth recorded on the formation. [Editor’s note: The routes, from left to right, are Left Facet (13 pitches, 5.10a R, Harder-LaBounty-Thau, 2007); Monkeys In The Clouds (IV 5.10 PG13, Musiyenko-Stefurak, 2015); South Face (III 5.10, Croft-Grant-Grant-Schwartz, 2014); Pig with Lipstick (11 pitches, 5.9 R, LaBounty-Thau, 2010); Right Facet (11 pitches, 5.9, Harder- LaBounty, 2009).]

To descend, we made two rappels from high on the ridge—one to the north and one to the east. We climbed in June and felt the route would likely be warm enough to climb in late or early season, as long as snow did not affect the approach. Oh, and check the forecast or end up like us: Monkeys in the Clouds (IV 5.10 PG13).

– Vitaliy Musiyenko